Santa Clara County used less than half of the COVID-19 vaccines it received.
The county has vaccinated more than 47,000 people after receiving 110,000 vaccines so far, said COVID-19 county testing officer Marty Fenstersheib. At least 122,950 Pfizer and Moderna vaccines have been distributed to the municipality, according to its website.
The 47,000 people vaccinated in Santa Clara County do not include injections given at Veterans Affairs clinics and federal programs.
The data are released a week after the San José Spotlight has repeatedly asked the county to release the number of vaccines administered so far. While the state reports these numbers on its website, the numbers include 14 other counties – including some counties in Humboldt and Mendocino. The county pointed the finger at private hospitals for not providing this information.
Fenstersheib attributed the slow pace of vaccinations to health professionals who were hesitant to receive the vaccine.
“It brings up the issue of people’s fears about security,” said Fenstersheib. “I think that as soon as we overcome that obstacle and people accept the vaccine more readily, you will see that number increase considerably.”
But health officials have not provided any data on how many people are actually refusing the vaccine. During a recent news conference, Governor Gavin Newsom said that state health officials are still trying to measure how many people are cutting vaccines.
Fenstersheib also said that sending the vaccine to hospitals and ensuring that it is stored properly also takes time.
Health leaders need to vaccinate at least 140,000 health workers to get through the first tier, said Public Health Officer Dr. Sara Cody. County supervisor Otto Lee said health officials hope to start administering 6,000 vaccines a day.
Santa Clara County has 78,683 cumulative COVID-19 cases and 815 deaths as of January 7. At least 1,362 of those cases and 17 of those deaths have occurred in the past few days.
In explaining the delay in releasing the number of people vaccinated, a county spokesman said local health officials depend on the state to monitor the doses administered at each hospital and private clinic in the area.
However, the state displays only the number of vaccines administered per region, which means that Santa Clara County numbers are packed with data from 15 other counties, including some as far away as Humboldt and Mendocino counties.
Since January 5, 125,290 doses have been administered in the region of 15 counties including Santa Clara County.
Several health care providers have told San José Spotlight that they have been monitoring vaccines given since the first injections by Pfizer and Moderna arrived in Silicon Valley in December.
Joy Alexiou, a spokeswoman for the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, said the county’s three hospitals and clinics had vaccinated 8,154 people by January 6. Alexiou said he had no information on how many doses the hospitals received.
Stanford Health Care vaccinated 13,563 people as of January 5, said spokeswoman Lisa Kim. The Palo Alto facility received 25,636 doses by January 6.
The county is providing vaccines for its own health care system, Stanford Health Care and community health clinics.
Kaiser Permanente vaccinated 45,000 people in 21 hospitals in the bay area and in the Central Valley. A Kaiser spokesman said the company had no information on the amount of vaccines it had on hand and did not detail how many vaccines it administered in each county of facility.
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Contact Mauricio La Plante at [email protected] or follow @mslaplantenews on Twitter.